| The biggest looser... if this passes will be, imho, the engineering firms and equipment vendors who push this stuff onto municipalities. An engineering firm from Montana has been giving presentations all over my area of Idaho, trying to drum up business. Of course, they want to be the prime contractor if they can get any little town to bite. And, of course, they already have vendors in mind.
Actually, it was kind of amusing that they presented in my town of 3200 that already has DSL. Apparently, they just assumed that Qwest had not done any DSL here, but they put it in last year. I showed up, just to hear the presentation (also, it was held at the Elk's lodge, which has a very well stocked bar!). They sure wanted to put fiber everywhere, even though there is no way this town could afford it. The presenter did at least acknowledge that financing would be a 'challenge'. And since Qwest rolled out 5mb DSL, I don't hear any complaining about broadband speeds in this little prairie town. |
